Northampton’s MPs have defended their decision to vote in favour of a £30-a-week cut to a disability benefit despite fears the move could “push sick and disabled people further away from work”.

The controversial measures to reduce the amount of Employment and Support Allowance (ESA) for some new claimants were twice defeated in the House of Lords.

More than 30 charities and members of the Disability Benefits Consortium, including Mencap, Mind and Parkinson’s UK wrote to welfare secretary Iain Duncan Smith to try and block the moves, part of the Welfare Reform and Work Bill. In the open letter the charity chiefs said the cut would “push sick and disabled people further away from work.”

But it is now set to go ahead after peers deferred to the elected Commons. All of Northamptonshire’s seven MPs voted in favour of the ESA cut.

Osborne's £650m stealth cut to the NHS

Liberal Democrats 18 March, 2016 @ 9:46 AM

Changes hidden in the Budget will mean the NHS has £650m less to spend on front line services, Liberal Democrat research can reveal.

The research on the budget, based on analysis from the House of Commons Library, reveals hidden changes to public sector pensions, passing the cost directly to the health service and other public sector bodies.

Plans to reduce the public service pension scheme discount rate will raise the Treasury around £2bn from 2019/20, but passes the cost directly to the employers.

The NHS is one such employer and their share is estimated to be around £650m.

The changes will also see teachers’ pension contributions rise by £426m, the armed forces by £314m and police forces by more than £100m. This is an unbudgeted cost will take money away from front line services to pick up the bill.

Liberal Democrat Leader Tim Farron said:

“Even by George Osborne’s standards, this is a vicious attack on our health service, schools and public services.

“He made grand promises about funding the NHS and is now making secret cuts by the back door.

“David Cameron said he would do whatever it takes to fill the NHS black hole, and we’ve now discovered that actually means cutting £650m just to help the Chancellor’s budget-day balance sheet.

“George Osborne cannot pull the wool over people’s eyes. Choosing to ask schools, hospitals, and forces to pay £2bn extra in pension contributions has a real cost, and vital services will have to pick up the bill.

“The Conservatives simply cannot be trusted to protect the services communities rely on up and down the country.”

It was not too long ago that the Liberal Democrats in the Lords led a vote in defence of feed in tariffs, a policy introduced by the Lib Dems in the last Government to boost a burgeoning solar industry.

Now the Tory assault has got personal, they have moved their focus on to people’s homes, attacking the small scale roof top solar panels that dot our residential landscape.

We have sadly lost the battle against the extraordinarily steep and abrupt removal of the feed-in tariffs for solar, wind and hydro. We have desperately tried to get this government to understand not only the seriousness of this in terms of moving towards a low carbon future that allows us to meet our legally binding targets, but also the depth to which investor confidence has been undermined in the renewable sector and the long term, negative impact on the economy that this has caused.

It is deeply saddening to see so much of the good work achieved by the Coalition Government, unravelled by the current Government. What is clear is that this work, which saw the tripling of electricity from renewable sources and made Britain the fastest growing green economy in Europe, was led by one side of the Coalition, the Liberal Democrats, and not embraced by the other. The Conservative Government’s actions since May 2015 demonstrate that there is no genuine commitment to the green agenda from their part, at all.

Local supporters of the Britain Stronger In Europe Campaign including several Lib Dems will be by the statue in Abington Street this Saturday (19th March). They will be meeting local people and putting across the message that being in Europe is essential for British Jobs, Britain's place in the world and for our security .

After 14 weeks of debates and protests county council confirms £65m cutbacks

Chronicle & Echo March 3rd

Speaking in the debate on the Conservative budget cuts Towcester's Lib Dem County Councillor Chris Lofts said

" Let us shut down this council completely and as quickly as possible"

" Let us set up three Northamptonshire Unitaries that have clear responsibilities and maintain local democracy"

" let's finish Project Angel and then sell it to the highest bidder. A unitary structure won't need it" said Chris

Cllr. Chris Lofts

According to The Chronicle and Echo : some believe scrapping Northamptonshire County Council altogether with three unitary authorities to cover all services in the county could save the taxpayer £50 million a year.

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